THIS IS RACHEL

Rachel is an author, blogger, and dessert activist. This blog has been read internationally by millions, but mainly she is just an ordinary homemaker living in the Midwest with her husband, David, and their three babies. They are (currently) renovating their 1970's colonial home and (always) cooking more food.

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THE WORLD’S BEST CHICKEN

July 11, 2012

Such a bold claim! I’m willing to make it. The husband raved. My taste buds have never been so tickled. Others have called it, “So Good it Can’t Be Described, Explosion on Your Taste Buds Chicken.” Seriously, I wouldn’t toy with you, reader.

Also, let’s talk about the elephant in the room. Mustard. I don’t like it. But. Turns out I don’t mind Dijon in the right quantities BECAUSE I LOVE THIS.

Preheat oven to 425 degrees. In a small bowl, whisk together mustard, syrup, and vinegar.

Place chicken breasts into 9×13 lined baking dish. Season with salt & lots of pepper. Pour mustard mixture over chicken. Make sure each breast is coated. Put some more pepper on, if you please. No need to marinate. (I love that because I hate marinating/often forget to until it’s too late.)

Bake for 30-40 minutes, or until meat thermometer reads 165 degrees. Exactly how long you should leave it in is based on personal preference and your oven. I like my chicken borderline dry, so I leave it in the full 40 minutes, and sometimes even bump the heat up to 450 degrees to really get the flavors baked on. (This is where having lined the pan with foil will keep clean up easy!) There will be extra sauce in the pan, which you can elect to toss out or use for extra flavoring.

Season with fresh rosemary. And prepare for people to ask you to make it again!

This is our household favorite recipe! I also make it often when we have guest. I love that this recipe rewired hardly any prep and you can put it in the oven and spend some time on the side dishes. I use chicken thighs instead of breast, however, and I also put full rosemary sprigs on top before baking. We also like tons of pepper in this dish to make it a little spicy. This recipe tends to take a bit longer to cope than what the instructions say. Also, if you take it out right when the chicken reaches 165°F, there is usually extra sauce which is great for starchy side dishes. If you cook it a bit longer, the sauce bakes onto the chicken and keeps it juicy. I feel inclined to mention that, with this chicken, we have NEVER had leftovers before. It’s that yummy!

Yummy! Easy, quick and simple. Delicious too. I added dill, parsley and green onion to the marination. I’m on a low fodmap diet, and it was nice to have such a tasty meal. I also used this in my salmon and shrimp. Marinating it overnight, if you remember, gives it way more taste.

Just like Susan, I’m on low fodmap diet too! I don’t know why I didn’t think of just substituting maple syrup to make a “honey mustard” sauce for chicken and other things. Glad I stumbled across your recipe. I actually have 4 skin on chicken thighs and 2 huge skinless breasts marinating overnight, because that is what I had on hand :) I also tend to batch cook larger amounts with 4 different main courses and then we rotate what we have, but wind up with the same dish 2 to 3 times for the week. This dish is for an almost 12 year old girl and myself. She will easily eat 2 to 3 of the thighs herself. And then I will have the other 1 or 2. And the breasts, sliced thin or in small chunks will make excellent cold leftovers for lunches. I also substituted the vinegar for white wine.